Disclaimer: Card Captor Sakura isn't mine.
Until You're Mine
- Chapter 4: Cupcake, I am a doctor!–
Hiiragizawa Eriol was dressed in black T-shirt, navy blue jeans and his usual black apron. He was arranging assorted flavor cupcakes on the display case. There's some carrot, cookies n cream and banana split cupcakes on his tray.
"Eriol, I'm telling you, we're back in this game, "Tomoyo said almost whispering. She took some cupcakes from Eriol's tray and started helping him sorting some cupcakes on the display case.
There weren't many customers that morning, and Sakura was out for ingredient hunting. The other staffs were working in the back kitchen, except for Risa and Akari who were chatting at the counter. Tomoyo thought that this would be the perfect timing to discuss their plan in helping her cousin/best friend, Sakura.
"What game?" Eriol asked back. He raised an eyebrow.
"Sabotaging Sakura's dates of course," Tomoyo said. Her eyes widened. "I've designed a couple outfits for our next stakeout. I just need you to come over my shop for fitting."
Eriol winced. He can't believe that the girl had designed some clothes for their stakeout. Eriol thought that Tomoyo was joking when she mentioned the idea a few days ago. "Do we have to do this?" He asked.
"Yes," Tomoyo nodded. "I don't know your measurement, Eriol. Fitting is necessary."
Eriol chuckled. "No. I was talking about sabotaging her dates."
"Oh," Tomoyo smiled sheepishly. "I thought you were talking about something else."
Eriol turned around and took another tray of cupcakes from the baking rack. "I don't think we have anything to interfere with. I mean, Sakura did say he agree to pretend dating. After one month, they are going to part their ways without us interfering."
"You're right," Tomoyo sighed. "But, that doesn't sound fun. It is sad to think that my design were for nothing."
"Well," Eriol paused as he put placed in the last chocolate cupcake with French vanilla butter-cream on the display case. "At least things will turn back to normal."
"And Sakura didn't have to worry so much about her father's threat," Tomoyo said. She took a mocha cupcake from the display case, peeled the cupcake liners, and took a bite.
Eriol stared at the woman next to him and remembered his conversation with Sakura. She thinks Tomoyo likes him, and that he should tell her how he felt. But he wondered if that was true. He had never seen Tomoyo giving him a slightest hint that she likes him.
Eriol turned around and stared at the board where customized orders from customers are recorded. Thank god, the customized orders aren't that much. There were 15 chocolate cupcakes with raspberry butter-cream cupcake bouquet order from Mrs. Kanako. Each bouquet would consist of five cupcakes. Then, there were 100 of very vanilla cupcakes for Miss Lin.
Eriol grabbed a tray of vanilla cupcakes to the open kitchen and began frosting them with vanilla butter-cream. "Are you going to wait for Sakura? I guess she would be back with those raspberries anytime soon."
"Sure, I'll wait for her," Tomoyo nodded.
Eriol glanced to Tomoyo and catch her staring at his frosted cupcakes. "Would you like to help?"
"I'd love too," Tomoyo beamed. She marched towards the sink and washed her hand with soap. She returned to Eriol after drying her hands with a kitchen towel. "What do I do?"
Eriol took a box of royal icing forget me not, and placed it on the table. "You can help me placing these flowers on the cupcakes."
Tomoyo frowned. "Can't I do the frosting instead?"
Eriol laughed nervously. "Tomoyo, the last time you frosted my cupcakes, it looked like poop."
"It wasn't my fault," Tomoyo defended herself. "They were chocolate butter-cream. Of course it looked like poop."
Eriol adjusted his glasses. "It has nothing to do with the butter-cream. It was your piping technique."
Tomoyo put her hand on her hips. "Then, you should teach me."
Eriol stared at her for a couple second. "You want me to teach you how to frost cupcakes?"
"Yes," Tomoyo nodded in enthusiasm.
"Alright," Eriol said. He took another piping bag with vanilla butter-cream and handed it to Tomoyo. "Watch how I do it first." He instructed. Eriol held his piping bag with his right hand an inch above the cupcake. He squeezed the bag and moved his hand in a circular motion around the top of the cupcake. It looked perfect.
"It's perfect!" Tomoyo said, admiring the cupcake.
"Thank you," Eriol said. "Now, your turn."
Tomoyo gripped her piping bag with her right hand and hold it above the cupcakes. Her hand was trembling.
"You should hold it with both hands." Eriol said.
"But, I've seen you holding it with one hand."
"Yes, because I'm a professional," Eriol replied. "And you're trembling."
Tomoyo hold her piping bag with both hand and started to squeeze it real hard.
"Stop!"
Tomoyo turned to Eriol and sighed. "What did I do wrong now? I haven't started frosting yet."
"You're putting too much pressure," Eriol commented.
Tomoyo turned to her cupcake and hold the piping bag a few centimeters above the cupcake. Then she felt Eriol slid behind her, and his hand was holding hers. She turned around only to find that she was leaning against his body.
"I'm going to teach you how to apply the right pressure," Eriol said.
Tomoyo felt his breath against her ear, and she started to tremble.
"Relax," Eriol said. He held Tomoyo's hand an inch above the cupcake and started to teach her how to put on the right pressure by squeezing the bag, and moved her hand in a circular motion around the cake. "There. It wasn't so hard."
Tomoyo took a deep breath and look at her frosted cupcake. It looked perfect, although not as perfect as Eriol's.
"What are you doing?"
Eriol and Tomoyo twirled around and discovered Sakura standing before the counter. She was holding a brown box in her hand. Eriol swore that Sakura was trying to hide a smile as they turned around.
"Frosting cupcakes?" Tomoyo replied innocently.
xxx
Li Syaoran was having his lunch in the hospital café. He was having some scrambled egg, mixed salad and sautéed cherry tomatoes with oregano. He took a sip from his hot chocolate macchiato and turned to his colleagues.
"I've never seen you having any interest into any woman. And now you're telling us that you have a girlfriend?" Yamazaki Takashi said. He forked some omelet and shoved it into his mouth.
"I'd like to meet this girl," Mihara Chiharu said. "We should definitely have a double date sometime."
In an instant, Syaoran choked on his drinks, and spilled some on his pants. He took a serviette from the table and patted it against the damp fabric. "I'm not dating this girl because I like her," Syaoran said. "I'm dating her because my mother wants me to."
"Then, how can we be sure if you're not lying?" Chiharu said and squinted. "I think you're just trying to avoid another set up."
Syaoran chuckled. "It's not that," Now that he thinks of it, it was good that he brought up that he has a girlfriend, although he didn't really like her. But at least, it would save him from Takashi and Chiharu setting up a double date. Well, not that he'd ever been to any of those dates.
Syaoran frowned. "Who would be happy with their parents arranging their love life?"
"I know Terada-sensei did," Takashi said casually. "He had his love life arranged. I heard that he's going to marry the girl next year."
"Tell me more about your girlfriend," Chiharu said to Syaoran. "What is she like?"
"Well," Syaoran paused and stared into his coffee to think. He remembered her sparkling emerald eyes and her long shiny auburn hair. He recalled that she had dimple on her cheek when she smiled to her mother. And let's not forget that she always smelled sweet. The first day he met her she smelled like vanilla. When he met her yesterday, she smelled of vanilla with a trace of cinnamon. "She's shorter than me. Green eyes, shoulder length auburn hair." Syaoran described.
"Big tits?" Takashi said. He was frowning a bit. In a blink of an eye, his frown disappeared when he felt something or someone stomped on his foot. "Ouch!" he yelped.
"I'm sorry, was that your foot?" Chiharu said. It was obvious that she was the one who stomped on Takashi's foot. Chiharu cleared her throat and smiled like nothing happened.
He took his drinks, and sipped more of his chocolate macchiato. "I just know that I can't get along with this type of girl," Syaoran said.
"What is it that you don't like about her?" Chiharu asked.
"I don't know," Syaoran sighed. "There are people you just don't like from the beginning."
"That doesn't make sense," Chiharu said.
"Yeah." Takashi agreed. "And most people said if you hate a person, you might end up falling in love. Some people end up marrying people they used to hate."
"Well, thank god." Syaoran said, rolling his eyes. "I don't hate her. I just don't like her."
"Well, you can't just not like her without a reason at all," Takashi said. "That's not fair."
Chiharu turned to Takashi and shrugged. "Well, I'm sure that she feels the same way towards you. After all, she's in the same situation as you. She probably doesn't want to date you either. You should treat her nicely," Chiharu advised.
"You sounded like my mother," Syaoran sighed. He fished for his phone when he felt the vibration. He looked at the screen for a couple beat, stood up and signaled Chiharu and Takashi that he will be taking this call. "Yes, mother?"
Speak of the devil.
"Are you free to talk?" Yelan asked. She knew that due to her son's work nature, there are times when he isn't that free to talk. Especially when he was attending his patients.
"Yeah, sure," Syaoran replied. "What is it?"
Yelan took a deep breath. "I wanted you invite Sakura for dinner tonight in our house." She said. "Your sisters would be here too. It'll be good to introduce them to each other. We're going to be family anyway."
"Mother." Syaoran said and paused. He was thinking hard how to get out from the situation. He slightly regretted saying that he was free to talk to her earlier. "I can't join you for dinner. I'm on call."
"Nonsense," Yelan snapped. "That just means that you're technically off duty."
That's true. Syaoran was technically off duty for the night. But should there be any emergency, he would still have to go and take care of the issue and deal with his patients.
"Kinomoto is busy," Syaoran blurted.
"Well, everybody's busy. But she has to have dinner too. Tell her I want to meet her. She'll come," Yelan said. "Why are you calling her Kinomoto, anyway? You're dating her. Shouldn't you be calling her Sakura?"
Syaoran sighed. "I'm not used to that yet."
"Well, get used to it," Yelan said. "You're going to get engaged in a month."
"Mother, that's undecided," Syaoran said impatiently. "I thought we agree we're not going to talk about any engagement. I'm not sure if we're suitable for each other. What if she decided that she doesn't like me?"
"If you don't treat her nicely, of course she's going to hate you," Yelan commented.
Syaoran replied her with a groan.
"Don't forget dinner at six. No excuses," Yelan said before hanging up.
xxx
"Who was that?" Sheifa asked.
Kimura Sheifa was Syaoran's fourth sister. She changed family's name to Kimura when she married to Kimura Sou five years ago. She was the closest to Syaoran among the other siblings.
Sheifa was holding her four years old daughter, Aiko in her arms. She put her daughter on the floor, and gave her a bottle.
"Syaoran," Yelan replied. "I asked him to bring Sakura to dinner."
"That's good," Sheifa said as she sat across her mother. "I've always wanted to meet my future sister-in-law. Fanren mentioned that she's a nice girl. And cute too."
"Yes she is," Yelan said smiled. After a while her smile disappeared and she sighed.
"What's wrong?" Sheifa asked.
"I'm worried."
Sheifa raised an eyebrow. "Worried about what?"
Yelan turned to her daughter. "I think your brother may be up to something."
"Don't bother him. Let him handle his love life," Sheifa suggested. "He's all grown up now. He knows what he's doing."
"It all seemed too easy. Your brother agreed to date Sakura without any fight when we brought up the issue," Yelan said, expressing her concern. "Shouldn't he at least argue about it?"
Sheifa shrugged. "Isn't that great that he listens to you once in a while?"
"Yes," Yelan agreed. "But I have a bad feeling about all this."
"I'm sure it's nothing," Sheifa said and smiled. "It's good to be concern about him. But don't get too involve with his relationship. They can't move forward in their relationship if you get so involved."
"You think so?" Yelan asked.
"Yes," Sheifa nodded. "I'm sure they would get embarrassed if you keep interfering with their love life. Knowing your son, he would oppose you if you keep interfering. You have done what you can. Why don't you sit back and watch what happens."
xxx
Syaoran stared on his iPhone screen and pressed the call button. He placed his phone to his ear and counted to five.
No answer.
He pressed the end call button and tried calling again.
Still, no answer.
Shit. Why isn't she picking up?
Syaoran put his phone into his pocket, took off his coat and rushed out from his room.
xxx
Kinomoto Sakura was dressed in her usual outfit. White T-shirt, jeans and the baby pink apron with 'Cupcakelicious' written across her chest. She took some raspberries and pureed them in a food processor. She turned off the processor and squinted at Tomoyo.
"What?" Tomoyo asked, raising an eyebrow.
Sometimes, Sakura wondered why Tomoyo love hanging out in her bakery instead of staying in her boutique across the street. She asked Tomoyo once, and Tomoyo said hanging out with her gave her more inspiration to create a new line.
"Nothing," Sakura shook her head.
Tomoyo eyed the pureed raspberry and her mouth wriggled. "You think your plan to pretend dating is going to work?" Tomoyo asked.
"I hope so," Sakura replied. "As long as our parents know nothing about it, I think it's going to work. Promise me you're not going to tell anyone about this."
Tomoyo nodded. "You can trust me."
Sakura took some butter and raspberry puree and beat them at medium speed with a mixer. "I'm just happy that we wouldn't be seeing each other. Although we still have to keep in touch. In case our parents suspect something," Sakura sighed and walked into the kitchen. She stopped when she saw the sink, and put her hand on her hips. "Guys!" She yelled. "What did I tell you about the rules? Clean as you go."
A girl probably younger than them walked towards Sakura and bowed. Her name tag showed that she was called Mai. "I'm sorry. I'll clean this up as soon as possible."
"I'll come back after five minutes," Sakura said. "If I saw any dirty bowls in the sink, I'm going to cut your salary. And I mean all of-"
Sakura didn't manage to finish off her sentence when she slipped on some grease on the floor and fell. Sakura landed flat. Both her hip and head hit the floor really hard.
Tomoyo was watching Sakura scolding her employee when she saw her slipped. "Sakura!" She screamed in horror.
"Oww!" Sakura moaned.
"Are you alright?" Eriol asked. He squatted next to her and tried to help her up.
"Do you think we should call the doctor?" Tomoyo asked.
The staffs began to swarm around Sakura.
"Risa, Akari. You two take care of the customers. Make sure they weren't alarmed. The rest of you, back to work! There's nothing to see here," Eriol instructed before he took Sakura on her arm and escorted her to a chair.
"Are you okay?" Tomoyo asked. Her gaze softened.
"Yeah, besides all the pain stinging on my head and my ass, I guess, I'm alright," Sakura assured. Then, suddenly she roared into a laugh.
Tomoyo and Eriol exchanged weird looks.
"Did you see the way I fell?" Sakura asked. "I mean, it's comical!"
"She's definitely hit her head really bad," Tomoyo said. "We should bring her to the hospital."
Sakura dismissed them with her hand. "No hospital. No doctor. I'm alright," Sakura stood up to show her friends that she's alright. "See? I'm standing without any problem."
"Uh, Sakura," Akari called out. "Someone wants to see you."
Sakura looked up and saw Syaoran standing behind Akari. "What are you doing here?"
"You didn't pick up your phone," Syaoran said.
"I probably left it in my locker," Sakura said. "Why are you looking for me?"
Syaoran sighed. "My mother wanted me to bring you over for dinner."
"What?" Sakura snapped. She grimaced when her head throbbed with pain. She touched the back of her head and thought that it was wet. "Okay, my head is bleeding," Sakura announced when she saw red liquid sticking on her fingers.
Syaoran strode towards Sakura, pulled her close and took a look at her head. "What happen?" He asked.
"Ow!" Sakura yelped. "You're hurting me!"
"She slipped and fell hard on the floor," Eriol informed.
"Is she going to be okay?" Tomoyo asked.
"Of course I'm okay," Sakura said. "Get me a band aid or something and it will stop bleeding."
"We need to get her to hospital," Syaoran said.
Syaoran took Sakura by her arm and she jerked away.
"Guys, I told you I didn't need to go to the hospital. I mean, who's going to cover Mrs. Kanako orders?" Sakura retorted. Then, she turned to Syaoran, and her eyes stiffen. "What are you, a doctor or something?"
"Cupcake, I am a doctor!" Syaoran snapped. "And don't even think about your job. Your health is more important. If you don't treat the wound now, it could get worse. What if you got a concussion?"
"He's right, Sakura," Tomoyo said. "You need to go to the hospital."
"Don't worry about the order. I'll take care of everything," Eriol assured.
"And I'll help too," Tomoyo volunteered.
Sakura stared at her friends and sighed. "Fine, fine. I'll go."
Syaoran tried to take Sakura by her arm and she jerked away. Again.
"I don't need your help," Sakura said. "I can walk on my own."
Syaoran took a deep breath and shook his head as he watched his stubborn, pretend-girlfriend walk wobbly to the exit.
"Sometimes, she can be really stubborn," Eriol whispered.
"Tell me about it," Tomoyo replied.
- End of chapter 4: Cupcake, I am a doctor!-
Author's Note: This chapter was a bit crazy! What do you think? Thanks to Sakura-chan Master of the Clow for beta :)
Please review :)